A Story of Flour and Water

My sister called it Modern Italian. I called it Italian Fusion. My dad called it “different”, but we all agreed that Flour + Water in the Mission District of San Francisco served up a cool, mean Italian experience.

We couldn’t make a reservation at Flour + Water but they told us if we lined up at 5pm we would get in no problem. They keep half the restaurant open for walk-ins. We were third in line, and got seated as the doors opened a 5:30pm. We had complimentary bread, olive oil, balsamic, and parmesan cheese, a bottle of Chianti within minutes.

We needed help understanding the small menu, but our waiter had no problem answering our questions and explaining every dish in detail. After much deliberation we ended up with three pastas and one pizza. None of them with a meaty pasta sauce. There was no bolognese insight.

The standout on our table was garganelli with braised pork, fingerling potato, cabbage and creme fraiche which was new to the menu. But! I thought my plate was fantastic and unique. It was the scarpinocco with aceto balsamico and I loved every single bite of it, especially cleaning the balsamic off my plate with my sister’s left over pizza crust. My mom was very embarrassed by me.

With it’s impressive dishes, it’s cool, dim, wooden interior and it’s pumping loud music, I promise that Flour + Water is the perfect place to go for a nice dinner, a casual lunch, your birthday, valentines day, a first date, or a last date. And it doesn’t matter if you’e in the mood for Italian or not. The only thing that matters is you’ll feel super cool inside.